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Two new reports urge radical reform of how the RCMP is managed

The federal government says it wants time to study recommendations for civilian leadership and accountability for RCMP

An RCMP watchdog report is outlining problems of bullying and harassment in the force as well as ways to address them. A lawyer with the Civilian Complaints and Review Commission says culture change will take a ?sustained effort.?

OTTAWA—The federal Liberal government would not commit Monday to act on pressing calls for civilian management of the RCMP contained in two damning new reports on harassment in the national police force.

Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said he is “open” to the idea of civilian administration for the Mounties, proposed in successive reports in the past 10 years, but he needs time to study it and would first present any plan to cabinet.

Goodale commissioned the two latest reports: one from the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission, which is the RCMP’s watchdog agency, and the other from former auditor general Sheila Fraser. Each recommended specific and immediate ways to improve how harassment is addressed by the force.

More importantly, both reports proposed an overarching and radical change to the way the RCMP is governed, saying civilian expertise is needed to modernize the administration of the hierarchical, top-down organization that has proven “resistant to change.”

“The RCMP is not a state unto itself, and it is required to comply with the same legal obligations to prevent workplace harassment, bullying, and sexual harassment as other federal employers,” says the commission’s report.

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“Instead, after each new harassment scandal has arisen highlighting anew the RCMP’s dysfunctional organizational structure, the RCMP’s reaction has been to merely circle the wagons.”

“If . . . over 15 reports and hundreds of recommendations for reform have produced any lessons it is that the RCMP is not capable of making the necessary systemic changes of its own accord,” says a report by the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission, signed by commissioner Ian McPhail. (Sean Kilpatrick / THE CANADIAN PRESS file photo)

Among immediate improvements, the reports called for: in-person, not online, training of RCMP employees, supervisors and harassment investigators and decision-makers; civilian not uniformed harassment investigators; a broader definition of what constitutes harassment; and better screening for legitimate complaints. Fraser said the RCMP should stop allowing alleged harassers to resign or retire before harassment probes are complete. She said a distinct, centralized unit should be created to deal with harassment complaints that would report to a civilian board of management, not up the chain of command.

The RCMP posted a statement from Commissioner Bob Paulson Monday night that disagreed with the reports’ conclusions that its policies and procedures are inadequate or piecemeal responses to ongoing harassment issues.

“Cultural change takes time: some have described it as generational,” Paulson said.

“There is no place for harassment in the RCMP. The vast majority of our employees are conducting themselves in a professional manner, in accordance with our core values of respect, integrity, honesty, compassion and accountability while working to keep Canadians safe.”

Goodale said it is “fundamental to make sure we make the adjustments necessary to ensure that workplace is harassment free, and I intend to do that.”

But Catherine Galliford, a former corporal whose long-running case was reviewed by Fraser, said she’s skeptical change will come anytime soon.

“I think it would be dangerous for me to hold my breath,” she told the Star. “I’m tired. I feel like I’ve given up a decade of my life,” having participated in five reviews of workplace harassment in the RCMP. Galliford settled her lawsuit last year and retired from the RCMP, a decade after she went on sick leave in 2006, diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of workplace harassment.

She had urged Fraser to recommend that the RCMP get out of provincial policing altogether and become a federal police force “because people are falling through the cracks” in an “insular” force that she believes has become too big to be managed.

“This is the goal for Minister Goodale, to change that culture but how long is it going to take?” she asked. “Is it going to move once again at the pace of an iceberg?”

While Fraser’s report looked at four individual cases, the commission’s report was a broad systemic examination of RCMP policies and practices. It examined RCMP handling of 264 formal complaints from February 2013 to February 2016, including 69 filed after the RCMP adopted a new harassment policy in 2014. Only three of those 69 complaints met the RCMP’s definition of harassment, a “startling, low rate” that the commission said raises “serious concerns” about the quality of the RCMP’s investigative and decision-making process.

It concluded the Mounties are incapable of policing themselves.

“If the last 10 years, over 15 reports and hundreds of recommendations for reform have produced any lessons, it is that the RCMP is not capable of making the necessary systemic changes of its own accord,” said the report, signed by commissioner Ian McPhail.

“I believe that the RCMP would truly benefit from the external expertise that the board members would bring in the overall management of the force,” Fraser wrote.

Combined, the two reports represent yet another wake-up call to the federal government.

The commission’s review said workplace harassment is taking a toll on the RCMP’s operational effectiveness, making it less able to cope with chronic recruitment and staffing shortages.

It said harassment runs the gamut from supervisors publicly berating subordinates, using abusive language such as “you're dirt;” “you’re a bullshit member;” “nobody wants to work with you;” to refusing the use of a police cruiser, denying leave, imposing punitive transfers; adding inappropriate and unprofessional comments to police reports to interfere with another employee’s credibility; entering a Mountie’s residence without authority or legal justification; repeatedly going to a Mountie’s home while the individual is on sick leave; selectively applying disciplinary measures; ordering a Mountie to give another officer a poor performance assessment when not warranted; changing a job description or qualifications to suit a particular applicant, or promising a job to a friend before a competition is held.

Officers reported reprisals for reporting harassment, such as being denied backup on emergency calls. Several reported taking sick leave as a result of harassment or work-related stress. When the commission sought data, the RCMP said it does not track such figures, so it’s impossible to know how much absenteeism, disability or sick leave is related to workplace bullying.

Lawyer Emma Phillips, who acted as counsel to the Civilian, worked with retired Justice Marie Deschamps’s inquiry into gender-based harassment in the military, and said while the two probes looked at different issues, she was surprised to see how widespread abuse of authority is in the RCMP.

The call for greater civilian expertise in the RCMP’s leadership structure — first recommended in 2007 by a federal task force but rejected by successive commissioners and the previous Conservative government — coincides with a move by organizers of a union drive to press for some kind of joint labour-management board of directors for the force

As reported in the Sunday Star, the National Police Federation is appealing for change at a time when Paulson has announced his retirement June 30.

The report invites the government to consider three possible leadership models for the RCMP:

The Canadian Armed Forces model. This would split operational and administrative responsibilities, like the military does. A civilian deputy minister is responsible for administrative and financial matters regarding the military, and the chief of defence staff, a military officer, is responsible for all operations.

The New York City Police Department model. This would see a civilian commissioner, supported by expert civilian deputies, reporting to the Minister of Public Safety, with operational independence ensured by a senior uniformed officer with responsible for operations. The report notes the NYPD is similar in size to the RCMP.

A Civilian Board of Management model. This would see civilians appointed to a management board, similar to a board of directors, to guide administrative, financial and human resource decisions, while leaving police operations to a uniformed commissioner and senior sworn RCMP members. A 2007 federal task force led by lawyer David Brown called for a civilian management board, as did several reports by a reform implementation council and the Canadian Association of Police Boards.

A third damning report is expected Tuesday when the current federal auditor general Michael Ferguson reports on the RCMP’s provision of mental health supports to its employees.

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